In the manufacture of various electrical devices, there is frequently a need to terminate a number of insulated wires to insulation piercing contacts arranged in rows and/or columns within the device. Concomitant with the terminations of the wires, there is an added requirement that the wires be placed in strain relief notches formed in the electrical device. One such electrical device is a connector widely used in the telephone industry to interconnect cable wires with banks of terminal pins arranged in a backplane of telephone switching equipment.
A number of tools and apparatus have been developed for inserting insulated wires into a connector, wherein each wire is pushed into an insulation piercing termination element and into a strain relief slot formed in a housing of the connector. For example, in U.S. Pat. No. 3,959,868, issued July 1, 1976 to I. Mathe, there is shown an insertion tool which includes a blade or group of blades, each having a first section for pushing an insulated wire into a pair of aligned insulation piercing termination elements, a second section, narrower than the first, for pushing the wire into a strain relief slot, and a bifurcated section at the end of the blade for guiding the wire into the strain relief slot.
In other semi-automatic wire insertion machines, such as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,995,358, issued Dec. 7, 1976 to R. A. Long et al., pairs of wires are simultaneously sheared and inserted into insulation piercing terminations mounted on opposite sides of a connector. In use of this particular machine an attending operator grasps a pair of insulated cable wires and moves the wires beneath a pair of alignment flippers and then against a pair of switch actuators which are moved to operate a pair of switches. Operation of both switches initiates movement of a pair of oppositely disposed insertion blades that control through an interconnected mechanism, the pivoting of the flippers to push the wires against reference surfaces and into alignment with the ends of the insertion blades and the oppositely disposed pair of insulation piercing terminations. Further movement of the insertion blades act to shear and then insert the wires into the pair of aligned insulation piercing terminations.
There is still a need for a machine for inserting insulated wires into insulation piercing terminations arrayed in columns and rows in a connector and for inserting sections of the wires in strain relief notches which are laterally offset with respect to each of the columns of insulation piercing terminations. Further, such a machine should possess the capability of shearing the wires at different points in accordance with the particular row of terminals in which the wires are inserted.